


What's The Rumpus?

by Kemmasandi, MlleMusketeer



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Other, Sticky Sexual Interfacing, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-10
Updated: 2015-09-27
Packaged: 2018-04-08 13:56:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4307682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kemmasandi/pseuds/Kemmasandi, https://archiveofourown.org/users/MlleMusketeer/pseuds/MlleMusketeer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Megatron goes back in time to retrieve something - someone, rather - very precious to him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> It's like a fixit fic, only Megatron is the one doing the fixing. The authors are simply doing his bidding, like good little Decepticons.
> 
> (Further tags to be added if and when they become necessary.)

_When the whole thing's over, there's gonna be hell to pay_

_'Cause when it's upside, downside, inside out, what more can you say?_

 

Ultra Magnus would never get used to running into Megatron in the corridors of the Lost Light, but there was something a bit off about the (ex) warlord coming towards him. More off than usual. For one thing, Megatron did not hurry unless there was something very wrong. Since there was a distinct lack of alert klaxons, fires, and screaming, this meant that Megatron was hurrying because he knew about something wrong that Magnus didn’t yet, and that meant nothing but bad things.

For another, he appeared to be carrying something.

Magnus’s threat assessment went up from _there is a Decepticon warlord aboard_ to _Brainstorm-level mayhem_.

Judging by the nondescript yellow briefcase dangling below whatever it was Megatron clutched in his arms, he wasn’t wrong about that.

It also meant that whatever Megatron was up to, it was highly inadvisable at worst, and enough to throw him in the brig for at best.

He set a course for interception and approached.

Megatron’s helm was at that moment bent, looking at whatever he held, talking to it. He must have heard Magnus’s footsteps, because his helm jerked up and his optics narrowed, his lips skinning back from his dentae in a way that abruptly reminded Magnus that the Magnus armor wasn’t entirely infallible, and that he was very small indeed under it.

He reset his vocaliser. “Possession of that briefcase is not permitted by the author--”

He didn’t finish his sentence. Megatron turned and snarled in his face, arms tightening around his burden. “Out of my way!”

There was a sound from the collection of parts in Megatron’s arms, as of something ancient clearing the dust out of its joints.

“Megatron, don’t,” it said. “Not on my account.”

It was a mech, Magnus realised. “Megatron, who is this?”

Megatron moved to shield the mech better. “Out. Of. My. _Way_. Magnus. That’s an order.”

Ultra Magnus stepped aside to show willing, and the former warlord strode straight past. Heading in the direction of the medbay.

“Are you out of your processor, Megatron? That’s an enforcer,” said his burden. Magnus got a brief impression of blue optics turned toward him, frightened. He repressed the prickle of unease through his circuits; he didn’t like having that look turned on him, and he really didn’t like the way the mech curled closer to Megatron, as if he expected protection from him.

He gave the two of them a safe margin, then turned back the way he had come and followed them down the hallway.

“Former Enforcer,” Megatron corrected. “Or so I hear.”

“You know him? How?”

“Compatriots in madness,” grunted the former Decepticon warlord, with a twist to his tone that Magnus might have called fondness coming from someone--well, anyone not Megatron. “We’ll leave it at that. Until you’re repaired, at least.”

Ultra Magnus commed Ratchet. He at least deserved warning of...whatever this was coming his way. Megatron and his...friend?

There were some things you simply couldn’t mentally prepare for. Megatron had apparently gone back in time to find this mech, whoever he was, and...well, if the words ‘rescue’ and ‘Megatron’ didn’t sit so ill together, he’d call this a rescue.

And, as bad luck and the universe’s terrible sense of humor would have it, Chromedome and Rewind hadn’t yet vacated the premises by the time Megatron showed up. There was a general rapid scramble for the exit.

Ratchet arrived from the storeroom, thunder hanging about his brows. “The Pit is this?”

Megatron placed his company onto the surface of the nearest medical berth. He jerked his helm down, indicating the strange mech. “Repair him.”

Both Ratchet and Ultra Magnus scanned the mech, who looked somewhat discomfited to be the subject of attention, and yet defiant behind it.

Whoever he was, he was very badly damaged. Thick legs of a construction Ultra Magnus hadn’t seen since the last time he had consorted with Kup had been torn off above the knee by some sort of heavy machinery. There had been an inexpert attempt to repair the wound, electrical tape keeping the dangling ends of petrified fuel lines and electronics sealed and tucked up behind the remaining armor plating. The mech’s face was old and worn, pitted with the blemishes of constant minor rust infections of the sort that came with age or ill nutrition.

In this case, Magnus suspected both. He knew who - and what - Megatron had been before the war. The high-vis paint of a miner was peeling off the stranger’s shoulders and helm.”

Ratchet blew air out his side vents. “Who is he?” he asked, inspecting the patient. The patient eyeballed him back with suspicious blue optics.

Megatron volunteered only a single word. “Terminus.”

“Very informative,” said Ratchet. “Hello, Terminus.”

Terminus’ optics darted toward Megatron. The former warlord inclined his helm, ever so slightly.

Ultra Magnus logged the interaction, and began a personnel entry. Designation: Terminus. Friend of Megatron. Threat Assessment: Only Primus Knew.

Ratchet, whose job was at least simpler than Magnus’s in this situation, bent to examine the injured legs, then left, snapping orders to First Aid as he went.

Magnus resisted the urge to shift his weight awkwardly. He wasn’t going to get any answers out of Megatron in the near future, that much was clear.

Megatron raised his helm and stared back at Magnus, challenging. On trial for his life, Megatron had been collected and calm. Right now, though, he was anything but, and Magnus strongly suspected that he was keeping his battle protocols inactive by sheer power of will.

His optics went to Terminus, who seemed the calmer of the two. Who was this miner, and why was he so important to Megatron? Magnus pulled out the new personnel file and upgraded the estimated Threat Assessment to something similar to Megatron’s, if only because Megatron seemed willing to violate the terms of his parole--and who knew what other laws!--for his sake.

Ratchet returned, said something quietly to Terminus, who nodded, then went to work. Magnus averted his optics, not being particularly fond of watching Ratchet work.

Terminus made some small noise of discomfort--against his better judgement Magnus looked to see what had occasioned it, and saw Ratchet stripping away the electrical tape with practiced, rapid movements--and Megatron shifted his weight with an expression that promised trouble.

“Stop thinking about tearing my helm off,” snapped Ratchet.

“I said nothing,” growled Megatron.

“You were thinking very loudly. I mean it. I’ll have Magnus throw you out.”

Megatron glowered at Magnus. There was nothing in his optics of the former resignation that had made him seem that much less of a threat.

Magnus crossed his arms and stared resolutely back.

“It’s a simple enough repair,” said Ratchet, adding his own glare to the mix. His hands worked deftly at a particularly stubborn piece of tape. “And simpler if I didn’t have to worry about a firefight breaking out over the operating table.”

Terminus reached out and put a hand on Megatron’s arm. “Megatron. Let the medic work, please.”

“Oh, good, you’ve got common sense,” proclaimed Ratchet. Magnus winced. “Unfortunately, that’s in short supply on this ship.”

“Autobot discipline,” growled Megatron. “A complete oxymoron.”

Terminus glanced at Megatron, then at Magnus, then back to Megatron. He opened his mouth to say something and was interrupted by a cough.

“Yeah, we’re going to be replacing your vents too,” Ratchet grumbled. “Your scan says they’re utterly ruined by rock dust. Where’d you find him, Megatron? At the bottom of a mine shaft?”

Megatron’s lips skinned back from his dentae, still large, sharp, and obviously functional. “Yes.”

“Huh,” said Ratchet, a sound of utter disdain. “If I find the mech who let a worker go this long without basic upkeep… it won't be pretty, shall we say. Look at the state of this strut, will you?”

He reached for a heavy-duty metal cutter, and fed it up into the central hollow of Terminus’ thigh. There was an electric snap, muffled by the remaining upper thigh plating. He withdrew the cutter, pushed his fingers into the gap, and scooped out a thick fingerful of clumpy metallic residue.

“Full refit,” said Ratchet, wiping his fingers on a disinfectant cloth. “Did you spend any time at all in deep-crust mining operations in the Berenices Cluster, between about, oh, the disappearance of the Ark and the beginning of the war?”  

Terminus’ optics lifted from the residue slowly dripping out of his ruined leg. “Which war?”

Megatron stepped forward. “Yes, he did.”

Ratchet gave them both a meaningful look. “He’s got a classic case of microbial corrosion. Standing waist-deep in liquid that’s been underground for Primus knows how long twenty hours an orn is a definite risk factor for those. Which means that I’m more or less going to have to rebuild you from the waist down.” He looked down at the residue, at his begrimed tools, and huffed a vent. “Which means we’ll need the containment room. First Aid--”

First Aid looked at Megatron, then Ratchet. “On it.”

Terminus looked at Megatron as well. “Are you sure you can afford this?” he asked in an undertone; Ratchet pretended not to notice, though he gave Magnus an even more meaningful look as soon as Megatron and Terminus weren’t watching him.

Magnus wasn’t sure what he meant by that.

Terminus pushed himself up on an elbow and was talking earnestly to Megatron, who shook his helm. “It will be fine,” he said, something just this side of an order. “I’ll explain when you’re out of surgery.”

“Indeed,” said Ratchet. “Now, you can do this either offline or online. I’d recommend offline. Most people react badly to seeing their bottom halves removed.”

Terminus said, “Offline,” and Magnus was just beginning to think they might get through this without any murders, when the doors slid back and Rodimus barged in.

“Since when is he,” jabbing a finger at Megatron, “allowed to bring any of his friends--murder-buddies is more like it--onboard?!”

Terminus looked at both of them in confusion. Megatron’s lips curled back in a snarl, and very slowly, very deliberately, he turned to face Rodimus. The co-captain in question narrowed his optics, glared back, shoulders coming up as he rose to his full height.

“No fighting in my medbay,” said Ratchet, not so much as looking up from his patient’s legs. “I will have you both thrown in the brig, captains or no.”

“Megatron?” Terminus’s optics darted to Rodimus, then back to Megatron, dwelling on Rodimus’s paintjob and elaborate helm design. “This isn’t wise--fighting a noble?”

“Noble?” repeated Rodimus, the scowl collapsing in a haze of confusion.

“He is not a noble,” snarled Megatron.

Rodimus recovered himself with immediate fury. “Yeah - I was _Prime_!”

“Oh please. You didn’t receive the Matrix. You babysat it.”

Terminus’s optics got even wider. “What?”

Ratchet tapped the berth, drawing Terminus’ attention. “You’re exactly as old as you look, aren’t you?

“I’m afraid I don’t understand,” said Terminus.

In the background, Rodimus’s voice rose to an incredible pitch. “ _Babysat_ it? Optimus said I did a good job, how about that, then? Stick that in your cannon and smoke it!”

“He said that so you’d stop whining,” said Megatron.

Ratchet blew a gust of air out of his lateral vents, cast around for the briefcase, discarded and forgotten when everyone present had gotten a good look at Terminus. There it was, lying on the next medical berth over. “I don’t think I know much, either, but we’re not getting anything out of Megatron while Rodimus is in the same room. One moment, please.”

He rose to his feet, stalking past Megatron on his way to the door. “Rodimus. With me.”

Rodimus went, but couldn’t resist getting in one last jab. “Oh, I get it now. You were so desperate you went back in time to find yourself a frag buddy? Looks like you couldn’t afford a good one, either...”

The door closed behind them, and not a moment too soon. Megatron launched abortively after them, held back only by Ultra Magnus, who had foreseen the utter disaster that was letting Rodimus get in the last word.

“You may file a complaint of inappropriate sexual innuendo in the workplace against Rodimus later,” he said. “However, if you attempt a physical altercation, I will confine you to the brig.”

Megatron made a show of shaking loose Magnus’ grip, but the furious snarl subsided.

Magnus watched him a moment, then added, “Rodimus is too young to understand fully that such comments are not jokes in contexts other than those he is familiar with.”

Megatron favored him with a highly dubious expression. “And you would know that how, Minimus _Ambus?_ ”

Magnus frowned. “Recall my brother.”

“Ah, right, the _philanthropist_.” Megatron’s tone left the content of his thoughts in no doubt. “We were miners. That is rather a different sphere of experience.”

Terminus, rapidly losing his patience, ventured another attempt at grasping the situation. “Megatron, what is this place? Where have you taken me?”

Megatron’s optics flicked in the direction of the briefcase, lying innocently on the other medberth. “Forward in time.”

Terminus stared at him. Then at Magnus. Then back at him. His optics narrowed, and he shoved himself up on the berth with a forearm, which creaked in an altogether unsettling way. If Magnus had been less composed, he would have touched his own elbow out of nervous instinct.

“Forward in time,” he said flatly, and if he had sounded intimidated or confused earlier there was no trace of it now. “You do realise how ridiculous this sounds.”

“I realise,” said Megatron. “It makes it no less true.”

“Do you make a habit of picking fights with Primes in this new enlightened future of yours?”

Ultra Magnus couldn’t resist. “This is one way of putting it,” he muttered.

Megatron looked intently at the far wall. “I would beg to differ.”

“I suppose that’s better than fragging them,” said Terminus, with the air of someone repeating a joke.

Whereupon Megatron’s sheepish expression became downright shifty. “I suppose so.”

Terminus wasn’t stupid. Magnus watched as that sank in, and Terminus turned his attention to him with a somewhat resigned expression shivering in his EM field. “I suppose you’ll tell me more than he will. Are you a friend or professional acquaintance?”

“Neither,” said Magnus. “His parole officer.”

Megatron sat down on the other berth, shoving the briefcase that had started the whole mess out of the way with an absentminded hand. “Well,” he said, resting his servos on his thighs and leaning forward, “this seems to be a promising start.”

Magnus had not heard such blunt sarcasm in a very long while.

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

Repairing Terminus was the simplest part.

The hard part was relearning what to do with legs he hadn’t had for several decades.

Actually, no. The hardest part was dealing with Megatron constantly hovering in the medbay. Ratchet took to making him wash the glassware out of sheer desperation to keep him out from underfoot, while Terminus explored the medbay on legs that seemed to take every opportunity to dance out from underneath him.

It was going to take a while for the neural connections to reconnect, explained Ratchet, after the first few times he went for a floorward dive. Exercise would help, and practice.

Of course, the sight of Lord Megatron washing glassware attracted every member of the crew not on-duty or at Swerve’s, which did no good for Terminus’s confidence or Ratchet’s fuel systems pressure. Fortunately, Terminus was certainly not possessed of anything resembling a delicate ego. He seemed to find it mostly amusing - likely due to Ratchet chasing the onlookers out of the Medbay in a hail of wrenches.

“I suppose medic’s hands are useful for a wide range of purposes,” he remarked, rather drily, which made Megatron snort.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Ratchet griped, coming back into the medbay with an arm full of previously-thrown wrenches. Given that Megatron had heard him make similar jokes on multiple occasions, he concluded that it was simply an expression of the medic’s humor.

Terminus raised his optic ridges and dared a retort. “I don’t know. You are the expert here.”

“Oh, wonderful,” said Ratchet. “A smartaft.” He deposited the wrenches on a clear space of workbench. “How are your legs going now?”

“There seems to still be some trouble with the concept of weightbearing,” said Terminus. “So not as much as I’d like…”

Ratchet’s reaction was muttered, but unsurprised. “Hop on the berth, then, we’ll check the neural pathways. Off the top of my head, it might take you a few weeks to get back to full operation status - we had a Cybercrosis case last year, and your lower body neural net is _almost,_ but not quite, as bad as his was.”

Terminus took in this information with little outward reaction. “I thought there was no cure for Cybercrosis.”

Ratchet grinned. “This is the future. Anything is possible.”

Terminus looked to Megatron. “So it seems.”

Megatron knew that look well, though it was millions of years since he had last been its recipient. _You’re going to explain something to me_ , it said. _Am I going to like it?_

He knew the answer was no.

He turned back to the glassware, made himself busy. By a happy coincidence, this meant that he did not have to look at the expression on his old friend’s face.

Terminus, for his own part, was unsurprised by the reaction. He might have even said lack thereof, but there was a complex procession of thoughts evident in Megatron’s body language, once one knew how to read it - and Terminus, though he was many years out of date, had known Megatron better than anyone, even the other frames in his cohort.

It came with being an editor. Proofreading a mech’s written work, one started to notice the things being said between the lines.

Megatron was sparkbroken.

The other mecha disliked him at least, despised him for the most part. That by itself hardly surprised Terminus; even in this bold new world of Megatron’s, one couldn’t expect high-caste mecha to simply accept a miner. The depth of the hatred, though, struck him as odd.

 _Is this what hurts you so, my friend?_ he wondered. _You have done so much, you have changed so much, does it break your spark that you could not take it as far as we dreamed? Do you feel as though you failed me?_ Because Megatron would make it personal, would find a way to blame himself.

Terminus had never been so idealistic.

“Excuse me,” he said, looking to Ratchet. “May I ask a question?”

“Go ahead,” said the medic, without looking up from his datapad.

“Why does Megatron require a parole officer?”

Ratchet went very still. “He hasn’t told you?”

“I tell you, it is very hard to listen when one is dying of energon deprivation and a severe rust infection.”

Perhaps he shouldn’t have snapped, because Ratchet’s optics narrowed and Megatron’s shoulders twitched, both reactions easily recognisable as defensive. But what was done was done, and Terminus had lived too long in the darkness to fear the future.

“I think,” said the medic, with what Terminus could already identify as uncharacteristic diplomacy, “that Megatron ought to tell you himself.”

Megatron’s shoulders twitched again, the tiniest bit.

Terminus vented a sigh. “Megatron?”

There was a long silence, filled with expectant purpose, and then:

“I started a war that killed the planet.” Megatron made something like a shrug. “And I destroyed most of our species in the process.”

Ratchet looked down again. Out of his peripherals, Terminus felt a flash of anger go through his EM field.

Megatron’s field folded in close, vanishing between one vent and the next. The sounds of washing glassware intensified.

“I see,” said Terminus.

What else could be said? It explained the fury, the wholesale rejection. Though he couldn’t quite comprehend it - how did one destroy one’s own species? Cybertron had always been an intellectual concept to Terminus, as it was to many mecha who had been constructed and employed as offworld miners. But it mattered to him, albeit as that intellectual concept - what were Cybertronians without Cybertron?

Megatron’s outright dejection was new, though, and it unsettled him. He looked _old_. To Terminus, who remembered him as young, an idealist with a vibrant innocence to him, it hurt to look at what had been his protege. Megatron had made light of what he had done to the world. Yet here he was, clearly at the mercy of others once more. What the world had done to him in revenge?

A chill swept through his spark. He looked hard at the younger mech. He had a wide range of contact, and while the Institute might have been an absurd rumor to most mecha, to Terminus it was all too real. Shadowplay. Megatron was a prisoner here, whatever improvements he had made. What might his captors have done?

“Here is my second question,” said Terminus. “Now that I am here, what do you expect him to do with me?”

Ratchet snorted. “I don’t particularly care. We’ve picked up enough strays on this trip. One more shouldn’t make much of a difference.”

“He should be markedly easier to work with than most of the mecha on board this madhouse,” muttered Megatron. He lifted his helm and gave Terminus a sidelong look. “I feel as if I should apologise. This is no smoothly-run outfit, but a gaggle of rejects and misfits looking for a fairytale ending.”

“Don’t sound too smug,” said Ratchet. “You volunteered to lead us there.”

“You volunteered as well,” replied Megatron, deadpan. “There must have been something in the energon.”

Ratchet turned away, gathering medical tools. “Yes, and don’t I wonder that most days. Terminus, going to try walking again?”

Terminus made it across the medbay this time, wobbling all the way. When he felt his legs try to give way this time, he aimed for Megatron. Megatron dropped the thing he was washing into the sink and caught him, quite neatly.

“You and I,” Terminus murmured, “are going to have to have a _talk_ later on.”

Megatron smiled, small and sad. “Yes, old friend. We are.”

* * *

 

Every bit of plating on Rodimus’s frame was flared out in indignation. “I can’t believe you haven’t done something about this!”

Ultra Magnus pinched the bridge of his nose. “About what, Rodimus?”

“Megatron and his murder-frag-buddy! I can’t _believe_ you let him bring him aboard! We don’t even know what he turns into! He could be a bomb!”

Ultra Magnus ex-vented as quietly as he could. “Terminus does not fit the frame requirements of a k-class Decepticon,” he stated. “Furthermore, Ratchet has examined him thoroughly, and we _do_ in fact know what he turns into; a heavy duty mining transport.”

“Easily reformatted into a tank! Just like Murder-buddy Number One!”

Ultra Magnus had run out of permissible expressions of exasperation. “He cannot walk at the moment, let alone transform. Additionally, he is an entirely civilian frametype, which supports Megatron’s claim of time travel. Terminus has likely never experienced a day of combat in his function. He’s less of a threat than anyone else on this ship--” oh he couldn’t believe he was saying this, “--with the possible exception of Tailgate. Note that I say _possible._ ”

“Oh, yes, not a threat,” said Rodimus. “Even with Megatron hanging on his every word?”

“Threatening Terminus is unlikely to remedy that risk factor.”

“Well, you should _do something._ ”

“Such as?”

“Lock them up!”

“Without a warrant?”

“Megatron stole the briefcase,” said Rodimus. “I’d say that counts for some sort of parole violation.”

“It will,” agreed Magnus, “but an arrest warrant requires the entire command staff, not just you and I, to issue.”

“Well, you shouldn’t leave them together,” Rodimus snapped. “Who knows, next thing we could be up to our necks in Decepticon babies.”

“That is absurd.”  Magnus frowned. “I have read the Decepticon operational regulations. They stipulate charge barriers for all levels of the command structure.”

Rodimus wiped his knuckles over his optics. “Stop being so literal! This is an emergency.” He looked away. “ _Drift_ would have understood.”

“Perhaps,” said Magnus. “I do not understand how insulting me will improve the situation. I trust neither Megatron nor Terminus. There is simply very little practical ground to do anything more than what we have already done about them, and what little I can do would simply worsen the situation. The fool’s energon will damp some of Megatron’s abilities, but I do not like the idea of seriously provoking him until it has had longer to work. And Terminus is, in this case, innocent of any charge. I will not lock up an innocent mech.”

“He’s Megatron’s friend,” said Rodimus. “He has to have done _something.”_

“We have all done _something_ ,” said Ultra Magnus, mimicking the emphasis on the word. “‘Something’ simply is not enough.”

Rodimus threw himself down in his chair with a sharp huff of vents. “I don’t like it. I have a bad feeling about it, okay? Former Prime. Chosen one. All that. Ignore it at your peril.”

“I’m not ignoring it,” said Ultra Magnus, very deliberately. “I am telling you that there is _nothing we can do about it at the present time that won’t make it worse._ ”

Rodimus jammed his fans. The noise produced was an illustrative expression of his frustration, and made Minimus Ambus shudder deep inside the Magnus armor. “Frag that.”

He did not argue, however, so Magnus took it as a victory.

He waited a few moments before adding, “However, I have managed to get them both an appointment with Rung. Separately.”

Rodimus looked at him. Then the grin spread across his faceplate. “Magnus, you’re _brilliant._ ”

“It is standard procedure.” It wasn’t really, but Megatron wasn’t standard procedure either. Magnus was codifying standard procedure as he went. It _would be_ standard procedure. “Rung is quite eager to meet Terminus.”

Rodimus snickered. “Oh I bet.”

* * *

 

The results of that meeting were not what Magnus expected. Rung came up to him in the hall. “Ultra Magnus, I believe you logged a request to have a psychiatric evaluation on Terminus performed. I have the results. You understand that patient confidentiality forbids me from disclosing more than the broad terms required for a military evaluation.”

“Yes,” said Ultra Magnus. “My office.”

Once Rung had ensconced himself in the chair, he tweaked his spectacles and looked down at the datapad in his hands. “Well. I have good news. Terminus seems to be an exceedingly stable individual with a strong sense of empathy and personal responsibility. From my time with him, I believe you do not need to be concerned about his association with Megatron. Indeed, it is likely to be beneficial.”

Magnus cycled his optics. “That is quite a strong judgement.”

“Yes,” said Rung, with a beneficent smile. “Well, either that or he is an individual with truly frightening and subtle powers of manipulation, but I believe the likelihood of this to be very low. He is honest about his confusion, and I would like to continue to meet with him as he integrates into the crew and our current timeframe, but my initial feelings are hopeful.”

“Has he given any indication of his relationship with Megatron?”

“He views himself as Megatron’s mentor,” said Rung. “‘Proofreader’, to use his term. There is a protective element, yes, but nothing like Megatron’s toward him.” A reshuffling of datapads. “He did not react particularly well to my questions regarding Terminus.”

“He was not threatening?” asked Magnus.

“Oh, no, nothing like that.” Rung sighed. “He simply sat there. ‘Loomed’ is the word, I think.”

“Loomed,” said Magnus, and pinched the bridge of his nose. He was doing that far too much these days.

“I believe he has a lot of thoughts he does not want to think,” said Rung. “It is only to be expected.”

 


End file.
